Friends?
by bisoux
Summary: Tristan. Rory. PJ Harvey tickets. An ensuing friendship. chapter 2 reedited!
1. Chapter 1

"Why'd you get them?" she demanded.

"Because, I'm sorry alright Rory? Can't we just start over, possibly become friends, civil" he pleaded; his eyes giving away his sincerity and desperation.

"They must've cost a fortune," softening her tone.

"Cost doesn't matter, really. I just heard you liked PJ Harvey and thought maybe we could go together."

"Well, I guess---DEAN!" her eyes moving towards the tall form emerging from a truck. "What are you doing here?" moving towards him.

"I was coming to apologize for everything but GOD Rory! You told me there was nothing going on between you and richie rich, yet when I show up here you just happen to be with him?" he steamed as a small crowd formed to watch the drama unfold.

"No Dean, its not like that." Rory defended.

"I just can believe you." he bit back turning in the direction of his parked car.

Dean, no! I love you, I hate Tristan" she called after him in a feeble attempt to keep him from leaving her. Dean spun around and quickly caught her in his arms.

"I love you too Rory" he whispered but she was too distracted by the anguish contorted on Tristan's face as he dropped the pair of tickets he had hoped would construct some type of friendship between the two and bolted as fast as he could from the scene. Shivering slight, Rory allowed Dean to wrap his arms around her tightly; placing soft kisses on her neck. "Wanna go?" as he wrapped his arm around her waist and headed in the direction of the truck once more.

"Yea," came her soft reply smiling at her boyfriend.

Climbing into the truck he enthusiastically told her about how at lunch today Mrs. Kim had almost caught Lane in her tribute to the Sex Pistols t-shirt instead of the cardigan she was sent to classes in. Her laughter filled the car as if on cue, but she failed to absorb anything he was saying because he focus was more on the blonde boy sitting in his SUV. She couldn't help but notice how he sat there, his hands gripping the wheel so tightly they almost looked white while normally teasing blue eyes had taken on a stone-like appearance staring straight ahead and at nothing in particular.

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"Hoooooooooooooney! I'm home" a voice called in the house.

"Hey mom! I'm in my room."

"Hey Sweetie. I heard the funniest thing today. Actually, I mean 5 minutes ago as I was picking up some dinner for us at Lukes. Is there something you forgot to tell me?"

"Lets see, went to Chilton, had some coffee, did some homework, oh yea, and I got back together with Dean this afternoon. How does Miss Patty do it?"

"She's like a cat hun. Sneaks in and out of places without being heard."

"Well, she should be a spy."

"Should be? She is a spy Rory! For the SHSS!"

"SHSS?"

"Duh! Stars Hallow Spy Society of course. Maybe Chilton is ripping me off."

"Definitely, the whole higher level education thing is a sham. I'm actually being brainwashed into becoming the ideal socialite and future trophy wife as we speak. Tragic really, but at least grandmas happy" she quipped.

"Banishing those awful images from my mind, how is giant boy doing?"

"Giant is good mom."

"Good, I'm glad you guys made up. Now come see the treasures I brought home from Luke's," she grinned prancing into the living room.

"Be right out!" Rory called; closing up her textbook and glancing at the PJ Harvey case, she allowed herself a moment to think about Tristan before retreating to the living room, her mother and the comforts of Luke's cheeseburgers.


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, besides my wish that they bring Tristan back to the show.**

**Reviews much appreciated!**

"Where is that stupid history textbook?" Rory muttered to know one in particular as she balanced her mug of coffee in one hand while concentrating on locating the blasphemous book. "AHA!" she thought silently as she found the textbook lodged beneath some gym clothes, she drops it into her backpack. Turning around she sees Tristan and quickly makes her way over to him. Last night she had a 'Rory pep-talk' and decided life at Chilton was better off with Tristan as her sort-of friend opposed to having no one at all, and that she never hated him at all. Really she came to the realization that she may have been a tad hasty in throwing the L-word around with Dean and what she really wanted was to continue her relationship with him as-is and that she also didn't hate Tristan. Maybe the two could be friends, and maybe if the gods truly loved her even Dean and Tristan could get along. "Hey Tristan"

"Hey!---" he replied spinning around to see his greeter; only to spin back once he sees Rory staring back at him.

"Tristan? Umm…so..I was wondering" she began to ramble. "Tristan, will you at least look at me so it doesn't look like I'm talking to a wall. I mean everyone knows I don't have many friends, and if rumors start that I'm talking to walls, well then you know that those are just going to get around. And can you imagine Paris, wouldn't she love that. Tristan, you there?" she pleaded as she watched him fill his bag with various books and paper.

"You see _Rory_, that's where we're different. Unlike you, I don't lie and pretend I'm all sweet and kind. So why should we talk _Rory_, I mean we aren't friends, lab partners. Me and you, have no obligations towards one another; besides who in the right mind tries and talks to someone they **hate**?" he spat out obviously frustrated by her previous rambling.

He tries to turn away when Rory murmurs "I don't hate you" trying to give herself time to allow his words to sink in.

"Funny. I'm amazed at how easily lying seems to come to you, _Rory_. I'm going to make this easy, okay? We are **NOT** pals, friends, buddies, therefore we have no need to talk." he replied coldly while stalking off towards their English class. Silently Rory followed stinging from the way he spat out her name, never before had she wished 'Mary' had escaped from his lips instead of the poison that 'Rory' seem to be associated with when he said it.

--------------

"At any rate class, before we disperse into our insolate time daydreaming while I try and drill literature into you I want to assign a group project due three weeks from today. My thoughts are that in pairs, wait let me rephrase, in assigned pairs each group is going to be given a Shakespeare passage that I want to be analyzed into initial and deeper meanings. Also, I want you to really work with you're passages; modernize it in some kind of creative way you see fit. I mean skits, re-writes, poems, pictures, anything you want that's imaginative people. I not only want you're usually exemplary writing skills on display here. Now, Paris Geller will be with Jeffrey Kuris, Brad Stuarts and Margie Peters, Madeline Lynn and Louise Grant, Austin Green and Joanne Freeman, Tristan Dugrey and Rory Gilmore…" Mr. Medina rattled off. Glancing over at Tristan Rory watched as his head dropped slightly at hearing their names together, while tensing up slightly. "Okay guys, get into your pairs and get on it."

Seeing that Tristan was making no effort in moving towards her, Rory slowly made her way across the class. "Hey".

"I'll do the outline for tomorrow, you can edit to depending on what you want to do. Then we can split the work in half. There's no need to do everything together."

"Tristan, be reasonable. What if our halves don't end up fitting together?"

"We always fit." He muttered.

"Please Tristan, it's important we do well. I think it'd be best if we just worked on the project together." Rory begged pretending she hadn't heard his last comment. "Please, I need this." Looking up he looks straight into her eyes and instantly regrets looking up at all because he knows that he doesn't have the will to ever say no to those damned blue orbs.

"Fine, lets just get to work and get this done."

"Okay" she meekly squeaked sitting in the desk next to him.

"We should just read it ourselves and get familiar with the passage. From there we can figure things out." Tristan stated more than questioned as he flipped open 'A Midsummer's Night Dream' and contented himself with reading until the end of class.


	3. Chapter 3

The next morning Rory came to English and found typed out pages laying on her desk and Tristan staring out the window.

**Lorelei,**

**I have read through the passage and think that we should individually analyze the piece ourselves and then fuse our ideas together. As for modernizing, since we are the only group that was assigned this play I thought it might be interesting to use the characters in the passage and do a remake of what they would be like in our time and how they may go about presenting themselves. Attached I've given you my analysis of the passage and a tentative schedule so that you can tell me when you are available to work.**

**-Tristan Dugrey**

No jokes, or teasing, Tristan's note was straightforward and the work he put into the rest of the package showed that he intended to spend as little time with her as possible. Sighing she stowed everything into her backpack and quietly waited for the day to end.

Act 1, Scene 1, Lines 180-251

_Enter HELENA_

_**HERMIA**_

_God speed fair Helena! whither away?_

_**HELENA**_

_Call you me fair? that fair again unsay.  
Demetrius loves your fair: O happy fair!  
Your eyes are lode-stars; and your tongue's sweet air  
More tuneable than lark to shepherd's ear,  
When wheat is green, when hawthorn buds appear.  
Sickness is catching: O, were favour so,  
Yours would I catch, fair Hermia, ere I go;  
My ear should catch your voice, my eye your eye,  
My tongue should catch your tongue's sweet melody.  
Were the world mine, Demetrius being bated,  
The rest I'd give to be to you translated.  
O, teach me how you look, and with what art  
You sway the motion of Demetrius' heart._

_**HERMIA**_

_I frown upon him, yet he loves me still._

_**HELENA**_

_O that your frowns would teach my smiles such skill!_

_**HERMIA**_

_I give him curses, yet he gives me love._

_**HELENA**_

_O that my prayers could such affection move!_

_**HERMIA**_

_The more I hate, the more he follows me._

_**HELENA**_

_The more I love, the more he hateth me._

_**HERMIA**_

_His folly, Helena, is no fault of mine._

_**HELENA**_

_None, but your beauty: would that fault were mine!_

_**HERMIA**_

_Take comfort: he no more shall see my face;  
Lysander and myself will fly this place.  
Before the time I did Lysander see,  
Seem'd Athens as a paradise to me:  
O, then, what graces in my love do dwell,  
That he hath turn'd a heaven unto a hell!_

_**LYSANDER**_

_Helen, to you our minds we will unfold:  
To-morrow night, when Phoebe doth behold  
Her silver visage in the watery glass,  
Decking with liquid pearl the bladed grass,  
A time that lovers' flights doth still conceal,  
Through Athens' gates have we devised to steal._

_**HERMIA**_

_And in the wood, where often you and I  
Upon faint primrose-beds were wont to lie,  
Emptying our bosoms of their counsel sweet,  
There my Lysander and myself shall meet;  
And thence from Athens turn away our eyes,  
To seek new friends and stranger companies.  
Farewell, sweet playfellow: pray thou for us;  
And good luck grant thee thy Demetrius!  
Keep word, Lysander: we must starve our sight  
From lovers' food till morrow deep midnight._

_**LYSANDER**_

_I will, my Hermia._

_Exit HERMIA_

_Helena, adieu:  
As you on him, Demetrius dote on you!_

_Exit_

_**HELENA**_

_How happy some o'er other some can be!  
Through Athens I am thought as fair as she.  
But what of that? Demetrius thinks not so;  
He will not know what all but he do know:  
And as he errs, doting on Hermia's eyes,  
So I, admiring of his qualities:  
Things base and vile, folding no quantity,  
Love can transpose to form and dignity:  
Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind;  
And therefore is wing'd Cupid painted blind:  
Nor hath Love's mind of any judgement taste;  
Wings and no eyes figure unheedy haste:  
And therefore is Love said to be a child,  
Because in choice he is so oft beguiled.  
As waggish boys in game themselves forswear,  
So the boy Love is perjured every where:  
For ere Demetrius look'd on Hermia's eyne,  
He hail'd down oaths that he was only mine;  
And when this hail some heat from Hermia felt,  
So he dissolved, and showers of oaths did melt.  
I will go tell him of fair Hermia's flight:  
Then to the wood will he to-morrow night  
Pursue her; and for this intelligence  
If I have thanks, it is a dear expense:  
But herein mean I to enrich my pain,  
To have his sight thither and back again._

_Exit_

**Girl loves guy, guy loves other girl, other girl already involved with another guy. Shakespeare must've had some kind of a portal into the future because Helena, Hermia, and Lysander's situation seems to reflect that of so many other people these days. I mean look at Helena, she comes off as a tad abrasive in her pursuit of Demetrius but her actions are pure enough. All she really wants is for the guy to have some acknowledgement regarding her existence instead of the oblivion and direct disregard he exudes towards her. As for Lysander and Hermia, their so caught up in their own little romance that they fail to really comfort their supposed friend. Helena proceeds to spill her heart out to the couple and Hermia does little to comfort her besides announcing that she had plans to elope with Lysander. Hermia appears to be selfish and has litte regard for those around her. Many say that Helena's soliloquy seems to be desperate, ill-advised and bitter but I honestly believe that she'd rather hurt herself than have Demetrius learn of the elopement of his beloved Hermia too late. Cupid is blind, he's reckless, spiteful but for Helena she'd rather find solace in spending just a small amount of time with Demetrius trying to stop Lysander and Hermia than having him hurt. The bible says something about how love is kind, never jealous but when love is unrequited, simply put, loves a bitch. It makes you crazy, full of jealousy, makes you cold but it also melts your insides and in the end it leaves you empty and alone.**

Rory had read and re-read Tristan's analysis of the passage c few times but it was this last handwritten sheet she didn't understand. It didn't fit in with all the typed pages and after she had read it made her feel guilty. Like a child sneaking chocolate before dinner Rory knew it wasn't something she should've been reading but there was something about it that made her want to read it again, maybe because it was written so fluidly, maybe because it offered a different perspective on the passage, or maybe because it gave her a small glimpse behind the curtain Tristan always had drawn around up.

Settling down, she opened up towards the beginnings of her own analysis when she heard a knock at the door. "Who is it?" she heard her mom chirp as she yanked open the door.

"It's Dean. Is Rory home?" the tall brunette replied coming into the foyer.

"Sure thing Giganto, Rory, boy at the door!" Lorelei called walking past her room and towards the coffee machine.

"Hey Dean, whatcha doing here?" she smiled coming towards the front.

"Just wanted to drop by and give you some flowers;" he replied hading her some daisies, "and to tell you I love you."

"Oh, thanks, but can we talk actually?"

"What's wrong Rore?" he panicked.

"Oh nothing, it's just what I said yesterday, I just don't want to use the term loosely or anything."

"Oh, that's fine, I understand," he nodded giving her a kiss. "Night"

"Goodnight," she replied closing the door behind him.

"So, child of mine, why the 'I don't want to say I love you' only one day after you decided to drop the L-bomb?" Lorelei inquired from the kitchen table as Rory made her way to her room.

"Oh mom, when did things become so confusing. I mean Dean gets all mad cause I don't say it, and so I figure that I miss Dean, I'll say it to make him happy but when I said it I also said that I hate Tristan and now Tristan won't talk to me, which is horrible because we were assigned this English project together and you know what, now at school I have no one to talk to cause Tristan doesn't even look at me, not that I should care but still its lonely, I even tried to banter and he acts as if I'm no one." she exclaimed breathlessly dropping into a chair and placing her head upon the table.

"Well, Rore from you're little 5 second remake of why life currently sucks for you, I think this ordeal and your reservations on saying the L-word may lead back to a certain boy named Tristan, and not just English partner Tristan but maybe the one who gave you special attention."


End file.
